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Dung Collector
"Take yer horse or cow dung. Good fertiliser and it burns well when dried, if ’n you don’t mind the stink. Pig slop, on the other hand..." Basic (FoN) Ensuring the streets are clean, these brave workers walk the alleys and thoroughfares with shovel and sturdy fortitude, pushing the worst of the offal out of the way to allow people to walk. Some are enterprising businessmen working the districts who can afford them, whilst others work for the city, patrolling the districts of those who pay them. While certainly not glorious, dung collectors often make do by selling dried dung as cheap fuel through the winters. Note: If you are rolling randomly for your Starting Career, you can substitute Dung Collector for Bone Picker with your GM’s permission. Main Profile Secondary Profile Skills: Animal Care, Common Knowledge (Empire), Consume Alcohol, Drive, Haggle, Perception, Search Talents: Coolheaded, Fearless or Resistance to Disease Trappings: Cart, Shovel, Bag of Maggots, Dung Career Entries Bone Picker, Camp Follower, Peasant, Rat Catcher, Vagabond Career Exits Bone Picker, Grave Robber, Rat Catcher, Sewer Jack, Thug Affiliations Due to the aromatic nature of their work, dung collectors find that they have few friends. However, bonepickers sifting through the rubbish and midden heaps tend to have similar habits and frequent some of the same areas, so the two groups tend to keep each other informed of things that may prove of interest to the other. Dung collectors may have a similar working arrangement with rat catchers, especially those that frequent the same sewer systems. Though even a rat catcher rarely spares the time to swap gossip with the likes of a dung collector. Even amongst the poorest of the poor, there is a pecking order. Despised and reviled for their stench and disgusting career, cities are far more relient on the lowly dung collector than officials would care to admit. Without their dirty work, insect and rat populations would explode into even greater numbers, bringing all manner of disease and filth. A Day in the Life Dung collectors make their modest living by clearing the streets of such organic matter, and carting it outside the city walls where it can bedumped unceremoniously, far enough away that the smell only drifts back in when the wind is right. Clever dung collectors will sell their dung to farmers who fertilize their fields with it, and many also dry the larger bits and sell them to the poor as cheap winter fuel. Dung collectors spend their days pushing their collection cart from street to street, scooping up one steaming pile and moving on to the next. On parade or feast days, dung collectors watch the route of the parade carefully, and make sure that anything dropped in their district is collected quickly so as not to offend the eye of someone important. There is never nothing at all for a dung collector to do, though some days the workload is lighter than others. Dung collectors tend to live far outside of the city walls, closer to the dung disposal area than to anything else. There they can track the progress of their drying dung, and keep an eye open in the unlikely event that someone tries to steal some.